Mst Out and HCC In

Mst1 and Mst2 are key components of the Hippo tumor suppressor pathway. In this issue, Zhou et al. (2009) reported that Mst1/2 ablation leads to hepatocellular carcinomas. Unexpectedly, Mst1/2 may activate another kinase besides Lats1 and Lats2 to phosphorylate YAP, and the role of Mst1/2 in YAP regulation is cell type dependent

Improved Decoding of Staircase Codes: The Soft-aided Bit-marking (SABM) Algorithm

Staircase codes (SCCs) are typically decoded using iterative bounded-distance decoding (BDD) and hard decisions. In this paper, a novel decoding algorithm is proposed, which partially uses soft information from the channel. The proposed algorithm is based on marking certain number of highly reliable and highly unreliable bits. These marked bits are used to improve the miscorrection-detection capability of the SCC decoder and the error-correcting capability of BDD. For SCCs with $2$-error-correcting Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem component codes, our algorithm improves upon standard SCC decoding by up to $0.30$~dB at a bit-error rate (BER) of $10^{-7}$. The proposed algorithm is shown to achieve almost half of the gain achievable by an idealized decoder with this structure. A complexity analysis based on the number of additional calls to the component BDD decoder shows that the relative complexity increase is only around $4\%$ at a BER of $10^{-4}$. This additional complexity is shown to decrease as the channel quality improves. Our algorithm is also extended (with minor modifications) to product codes. The simulation results show that in this case, the algorithm offers gains of up to $0.44$~dB at a BER of $10^{-8}$.Comment: 10 pages, 12 figure

Edge states at nematic domain walls in FeSe films

Quantum spin Hall (QSH) effect is an intriguing phenomenon arising from the helical edge states in two-dimensional topological insulators. We use molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) to prepare FeSe films with atomically sharp nematic domain boundaries, where tensile strains, nematicity suppression and topological band inversion are simultaneously achieved. Using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM), we observe edge states at the Fermi level that spatially distribute as two distinct strips in the vicinity of the domain boundaries. At the endpoint of the boundaries, a bound state at the Fermi level is further observed. The topological origin of the edge states is supported by density functional theory calculations. Our findings not only demonstrate a candidate for QSH states, but also provide a new pathway to realize topological superconductivity in a single-component film

Size-controllable synthesis and bandgap modulation of single-layered RF-sputtered bismuth nanoparticles

We here report a simple and efficient method to grow single-layer bismuth nanoparticles (BiNPs) with various sizes on glass substrates. Optimal conditions were found to be 200°C and 0.12 W/cm(2) at a growth rate of 6 Å/s, with the deposition time around 40 s. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) images were used to calculate the particle size distribution statistics, and high-resolution X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns were used to examine the chemical interactions between BiNPs and the substrates. By measuring the transmission spectra within the range of 300 to 1,000 nm, we found that the optical bandgap can be modulated from 0.45 to 2.63 eV by controlling the size of these BiNPs. These interesting discoveries offer an insight to explore the dynamic nature of nanoparticles

Graphene controlled Brewster angle device for ultra broadband terahertz modulation

Terahertz modulators with high tunability of both intensity and phase are essential for effective control of electromagnetic properties. Due to the underlying physics behind existing approaches there is still a lack of broadband devices able to achieve deep modulation. Here, we demonstrate the effect of tunable Brewster angle controlled by graphene, and develop a highly-tunable solid-state graphene/quartz modulator based on this mechanism. The Brewster angle of the device can be tuned by varying the conductivity of the graphene through an electrical gate. In this way, we achieve near perfect intensity modulation with spectrally flat modulation depth of 99.3 to 99.9 percent and phase tunability of up to 140 degree in the frequency range from 0.5 to 1.6 THz. Different from using electromagnetic resonance effects (for example, metamaterials), this principle ensures that our device can operate in ultra-broadband. Thus it is an effective principle for terahertz modulation